Lahore: Public transport system needs govt’s attention

[Naveed Yaseen]

By Atif Nadeem
THE quality of public transport in the provincial metropolis is abysmally poor and people have to go through inexplicable ordeals in buses and vans.

People face hardship when they take a bus or van to reach their destinations. It is very difficult to board a bus, find a seat and even pay fare. “It has become extremely irritating to travel on public transport because of inhuman treatment meted out to commuters,” said Muhammad Jawad, a student.

“It is outrageous that commuters are made to pay full fare for travelling without a seat,” said Ayesha, a working woman.Public transport vehicles are always overcrowded with the old, women and young being treated alike.

Senior citizens and women with children are not treated any different from rest of the people. In the male cabin, there are 20 to 24 seats while standing capacity for males is 30 to 40 people at a time. In women’s cabin, there are 12 to 13 seats for women and standing capacity is 15 to 20.

During peak hours, buses are filled to the capacity and yet more and more people are seen trying to get on board without caring whether there is a seat vacant or space to stand. Shortage of buses forces people to take any bus coming their way.

Commuters and conductors are often seen squabbling over fare as people find it difficult to pay for even a minimal increase in fares. High fares have rattled people and they have urged the government to provide subsidy on fares as common people were suffering.

Office bearers of the Urban Transport Union told The News they had complained repeatedly about the negligence of the Punjab Planning and Development Department. They said officials of the PD Department did not pay any attention to resolving public transport issues. They claimed the government had not devised any strategy to sort out flaws in transport policy and people were suffering as a result.

About why transport owners were not offering better service to people, they said the State Bank of Pakistan had declared transport owners defaulters and they had been facing financial crisis because of unprecedented increase in POL prices. They said the government had also not issued a notification of increase in fares.

They said transporters were trying to serve people better and things could improve if the government regulated public transport system.

They said the government should import CNG buses so that people get cheap transport, and should regularly check buses so that transporters bring out on roads fit vehicles. They admitted that transport owners were forced to overload buses to avoid financial losses in the wake of POL price hike.

They said the government should freeze diesel prices so that transporters do not have to overload buses and vans, adding that they did not compel people to stand in buses and vans but the people did it themselves because they had no other option as most vehicles were filled to capacity.

They said the government should increase number of public transport on all the routes to alleviate sufferings of the people.

About rows over variation in fares, they said the government should consult transporters when it fixed fares because they were major stake holders.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=136166